The invention relates to fishing equipment and, more particularly, to fishing nets.
Over the years, manufacturers of fishing nets have experimented with larger net sizes to extend the use of such nets to include predator fish such as Musky, Pike and Atlantic Salmon. These fish can weigh up to 100 lbs. and thus require a landing net with significant strength. A significant disadvantage of such large nets has been that they are too heavy. This was due to the amount of material required to make a net of the appropriate size and because the larger the hoop design the greater the center of effort cantilevered out past the handle/yoke, thus requiring greater strength. The amount of material required also made such larger nets expensive to manufacture. Conventionally, larger fishing nets have been made either with thicker (and thus heavier and more costly) tubing, or have been formed of extruded tubing with structural webs in the interior of the tubing to reinforce the tubing in one direction. The combination of factors has historically limited practical fishing nets to less than 40″ in length by 37″ in width at the longest and widest points.
Therefore, a need exists for an improved fishing net design that allows for the manufacture of large fishing nets that are of significantly reduced weight relative to their size and are relatively inexpensive.